Nu feminin allongé 1937

Jean Fautrier made this painting, Nu feminin allongé, with what looks like thick, deliberate strokes of paint. Imagine Fautrier in the studio, maybe a bit restless, circling around the canvas. The creamy whites and fleshy browns – they're not just colors, but emotional temperatures. I can feel the weight of the brown pigment, how it might have felt dragging across the surface. Then, he adds a darker, almost black border, framing the scene like a memory. I wonder if Fautrier was thinking about other reclining nudes? He's clearly in conversation with artists across time, but he's also doing his own thing. There is a tension in the painting, a desire to depict, but also a drive toward abstraction. Ultimately, painting is about this push and pull, and it’s never really resolved, which is what makes looking at paintings so interesting, right?